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P5/S8S^ 
'G 7 

Copyright, 1906, by Thomas Y. Crowell & Co. 
Published, September, 1906 



LIBRARY «f CONGRESS 

Twt C«»its AtctlvM 

S£^ 26 1906 

cu« A joie.,11.. 



Composition and electrotype plates by 
D. B. Updike, The Merrymount Press, Boston 



^ (ta6(c of €ontent6 



I. Comforts 2 

II. Pleasures 3 

III. Luxuries 6 

IV. Objects of Beauty 8 
V. Aids to Health 10 

VI. Satisfactions not dependent on Wealth 12 

VII. The Rich Man's Power 15 

VIII. Improving the Land 17 

IX. The Higher Opportunities of Wealth 20 

X. Giving by Men of Wealth 23 

XI. The Children of the Very Rich 25 

XII. Public Judgments of the Rich 30 

XIII. The World's Attitude toward Rich Men 32 

XIV. Publicity a Safeguard for Wealth 34 
XV. No Abiding Class of Rich Men 37 



Ottat ^ icW 




INCE the Civil War a new kind of 
rich man has come into existence in 
the United States. He is very much 
richer than anybody ever was before, 
and his riches are, in the main, of a new kind. 
They are not great areas of land, or numerous 
palaces, or flocks and herds, or thousands of 
slaves, or masses of chattels. They are in part 
city rents, but chiefly stocks and bonds of cor- 
porations, and bonds of states, counties, cities, 
and towns. These riches carry with them of 
necessity no visible or tangible responsibility, 
and bring upon their possessor no public or 
semi-public functions. 

The rich men are neither soldiers nor sailors; 
they are not magistrates, or legislators, or 
church dignitaries. They are not landlords in 
the old sense ; and they never lead their ten- 
ants into battle as did the feudal chiefs. They 
have no public functions of an importance com- 
mensurate with their riches. They are not sub- 
ject to the orders and caprices of a sovereign, 



iSteat or forced to contend with the intrigues and 
^ic^ce vices of a court. Such occupations as they have, 
in addition to the making of more money, they 
have to invent themselves. The public admires 
and envies them, and sees that they are often 
serviceable, but also criticises and blames 
them, and to some extent fears them. It is dis- 
posed to think them dangerous to the Repub- 
lic and a blot on democratic society; but at the 
same time is curious about their doings and 
their mode of life, and is in rather a puzzle 
about their moral quality. I propose to con- 
sider briefly some of the advantages and dis- 
advantages which great modern riches bring 
the owner and the community. 

t 

€omfotte 

The modern very rich man can, of course, 
procure for himself and his family every com- 
fort. He can secure invariably all possible com- 
fortable provisions in every place where he 
dwells, —in his own houses, or in hotels, trains, 
and steamers; but still his wealth will not or- 
dinarily procure for him greater personal com- 
fort than persons of moderate fortune can 
command. A twelve-dollar chair may be just as 



comfortable as a fifty-dollar chair. There is ^Ceaei 
pleasure in living in a palace ; but when its in- UtC6 
mates want to be comfortable they get into 
the small rooms, — into the boudoir, or the little 
writing-room, or the low-studded small parlor. 
A soft bed is for many persons not so comfort- 
able as a hard one. In short, adequate warmth 
and light, appropriate clothing, good bedding, 
good plumbing, and nice chairs, tables, and 
household fittings sufficient to ensure bodily 
comfort, are easily within the reach of all well- 
to-do persons; and great riches can do no more 
for their possessor in the way of comfort. The 
least physical ailment, like a gouty toe, or a 
dull ear, or a decayed tooth, will subtract more 
from comfort than all the riches in the world 
can add. 

it 

p(ca$nvc6 

With pleasures it is different. Some real pleas- 
ures are very expensive, and only great riches 
can procure them. For instance, the unob- 
structed and impregnable possession of a fine 
natural landscape is a great pleasure which 
the very rich man can secure for himself by his 
private means; whereas the poor man, or the 
man of moderate means, can enjoy such a priv- 

3 



i^teat ilege only by availing himself of great public 
IRic^e^ domains, or of unoccupied regions; and there 
his own privilege will not be secure, or trans- 
missible to descendants. The very rich man 
can provide himself with music and the drama 
without regard to their cost ; but it by no means 
requires very great riches to procure a quite 
adequate amount of these pleasures. Such 
pleasures as involve the purchase and main- 
tenance of very costly machines like yachts, or 
large automobiles, or of great stables filled 
with fine horses and carriages, or of large 
greenhouses and gardens, may be enjoyed in 
their extremes only by the very rich ; but then, 
on a smaller scale, similar pleasures may be 
equally enjoyed by persons who are only mod- 
erately well-off, and often the larger scale does 
not add to the pleasure. An active boy in a 
knock-about twenty feet long may easily get 
more fun out of racing or cruising than his 
fifty-year-old father can get out of his six-hun- 
dred-ton steam yacht. The young lawyer who 
is fond of riding may easily get more pleasure 
out of his single saddle horse, kept at a club 
stable, than the multi-millionaire gets from 
his forty horses and twenty different carriages. 
One advantage the very rich man undoubtedly 
has. Many so-called pleasures pall after a little 
4 



7-5 

■•'J> 



while. The possessor of numerous horses and ^tcae^ 
carriages, for example, finds that he has no wre6 
pleasure in driving or riding. He is tired of it 
all. Or, to his surprise, he finds his yacht a bore, 
and, on the whole, a plague. Then he can cast 
aside the pleasure which is no longer a pleas- 
ure, and take up with some new fad or fever. 
He can utterly disregard cost in turning from 
one pleasure to another. He can seize on costly 
novelties which promise a new pleasurable sen- 
sation, and experiment with them on a small 
chance of winning some satisfaction. This is 
assuredly a freedom which great riches bring; 
but it is not a very valuable freedom. One 
steady, permanent outdoor pleasure, if pursued 
with unflagging delight, is worth many shift- 
ing transitory pleasures. 

The public does not grudge their pleasures 
to the very rich, provided they can be pursued 
without harming others. Indeed, the public ap- 
proves all the manly, outdoor, risky sports of 
the rich, if not inconsiderately pursued, and 
rather prefers the very rich man who is extra- 
vagant in these ways to one who has no inter- 
est in sports. 

The pleasure of travelling is one which is open 
to the very rich, and this is in general an in- 
structive and enlarging pleasure. The length 

5 



iSteat of the traveller's purse is, however, the least 
^ictje6 important item in his equipment. The main 
items are eyes to see beauty, ears to appreciate 
music, a memory stored with historical infor- 
mation, and power to talk with the peoples 
visited. The very rich man, although poorly 
equipped, will do well to travel far and often ; 
but his relatively impecunious neighbor who is 
mentally well prepared for foreign travel will 
far better enjoy his journeyings, although they 
be much cheaper than the rich man's. 

Hi 

When it comes to what are called luxuries, 
the very rich have undoubtedly an advantage 
over other people, if one can imagine the pos- 
session and use of a luxury to be in any sense 
an advantage. Thus, the very rich can procure 
for themselves all sorts of rare and delicious 
foods and drinks. They can have fruits and 
vegetables out of season, and fish and game 
brought from afar. They can drink the finest 
champagne, or claret, or Rhine wine, or cor- 
dial, without ever considering its cost. Indeed, 
they may prefer a costly drink, and enjoy it 
more, just for the reason that it is costly. 
6 



These pleasures of the palate the man of mod- jC\iyutie6 
erate means can only enjoy in brief seasons or 
at long intervals. It may be doubted, however, 
whether the very rich man gets any more pleas- 
ure from his palate and his organs of smell in 
the course of the year than the man who is 
compelled to follow the changes of the season 
in the selection of his foods and drinks. Straw- 
berries in January are not so good as straw- 
berries in June, and strawberries for two 
months of the year, changing to raspberries, 
currants, blueberries, and blackberries, may 
give more gratification on the whole than 
strawberries for six months of the year. The 
same thing may be said concerning the enjoy- 
ment of flowers and flowering plants in the 
house. The very rich man can order from some 
florist a profusion of flowers for all the rooms 
in his house through the entire season. The 
regular commercial flowers like roses, carna- 
tions, violets, chrysanthemums, and so forth, 
will be supplied in great quantities, and the 
spring flowers will be forced in greenhouses, 
and will appear in the drawing-room in Janu- 
ary and February. These beautiful objects will 
adorn the very rich man's rooms the year round, 
and their fragrance will penetrate every part 
of his house. He and his family will enjoy them ; 

7 



iStcat but it is doubtful whether he will get so much 
^tc^ee pleasure out of all this hired decoration as the 
owner of one little garden and one little glass 
bow window will get out of his few beds, pots, 
and vases filled with only seasonable blooms, 
all of which he has worked over and cared for 
himself. At any rate it is a different kind of 
pleasure, and not so keen and inexhaustible. 
Money indeed can buy these beautiful objects, 
but money cannot buy the capacity to enjoy 
them. That capacity may or may not go with 
the possession of the money. 

tv 

OBjecte of TBcantif 

There are, however, luxuries of a rarer sort 
which the very rich man can secure for himself 
and his family, while the poor man, or the man 
of moderate means, cannot procure them at all. 
Such a luxury is the ownership of beautiful 
artistic objects, — of fine pictures, etchings, 
statuary, or beautiful examples of ceramic art. 
To have these objects in one's house within 
reach, or often before the eyes, is a great lux- 
ury, if their possessor has eyes to see their 
beauty. This is a clear advantage which the 
very rich man may have over a man of small 
8 



means. When, however, the accumulator of iQ^i^^^a 
great riches is an uneducated man, as is often ^c 
the case, he is little likely to possess the intel- ^caut^ 
lectual quality which is indispensable to the 
enjoyment of the fine arts. This is one of the 
reasons that the newly rich are apt to be ridi- 
culed or despised. They are thought to be peo- 
ple who are pecuniarily able to gratify fine 
tastes, but have no such tastes. 
The possession of beautiful and costly jewels 
is a luxury which rich people— whether edu- 
cated or ignorant— often seem to enjoy. They 
like to see their women decked with beauti- 
ful gems. It is to be said in behalf of this lux- 
ury that it is a gratification which does no bod- 
ily harm to anybody, and gives pleasure to many 
observers besides the possessor of the jewels. 
The only criticism which can be made on in- 
dulgence in this luxury is that the money it 
costs might have been more productive of hu- 
man happiness if spent in other ways. A mil- 
lion dollars' worth of diamonds, rubies, emer- 
alds, and pearls might have endowed a school 
or a hospital, or hav.e made a mill or a foundry 
a healthy place to work in instead of an un- 
healthy one, or have provided a public play- 
ground for many generations to enjoy. Never- 
theless, in some measure nearly every one en- 

9 



iSteat J^y^ ^^^^ particular luxury, whether in savage 
^icSe& or in civilized society. 



Jiibe to ^eatt^ 

In the care of health —their own and that of 
those they love— very rich people have certain 
indisputable advantages, although they also 
suffer from peculiar exposure to the diseases 
consequent on luxury and ennui. Thus, they 
are under no necessity of enduring excessive 
labor, but can order their daily lives so as to 
avoid all strains and excesses in work. More- 
over, if any physical evil befall them or those 
they love, they can procure all possible aids in 
the way of skilled attendants and medical or 
surgical advice ; and they can procure for them- 
selves and their families any advised change 
of scene or climate, and procure it at the right 
moment, and in the most comfortable way. 
Lord Rosebery has pointed out that this free- 
dom to spend money for aids in case of sick- 
ness or accident is the chief advantage the rich 
man has over the poor man ; but it should be 
observed that one need not be very rich in or- 
der to procure these advantages in case of ill- 
ness or accident. Moreover, remedies for dis- 

10 



ease are a poor substitute for health. The abil- J(ib6 to 
ity to pay for any amount of massage is an i^eaft^ 
imperfect compensation for the loss of enjoya- 
ble use of the muscles in work and play, or for 
the exhaustion of the nervous system. No one 
who has had large means of observation can 
have failed to see that the very rich are by no 
means the healthiest and most vigorous mem- 
bers of the community. The uneducated rich 
seem to be peculiarly liable to medical delu- 
sions, perhaps because their wealth enables 
them to try in quick succession all sorts of ex- 
pensive cure-alls and quackeries. Their wealth 
has its own disadvantageous effects on their 
bodies. Thus, the keen pursuit of wealth is 
often exciting and exacting ; to keep and de- 
fend great wealth is sometimes an anxious 
business ; and if great riches bring with them 
a habit of self-indulgence and of luxurious liv- 
ing in general, it is well-nigh certain that the 
self-indulgent and luxurious person will suffer 
bodily evils which his plain-living neighbors 
will escape. Of course a wise rich man may 
escape all these perils of luxury. He may keep 
himself in good physical condition by all sorts 
of outdoor sports. He may do as the Duke of 
Wellington is said to have habitually done — 
provide elaborate French dishes for his guests 

II 



i^teat 2it dinner, and himself eat two plain chops and 
^ic^e$ a boiled potato; but such an habitual self-pro- 
tection requires an unusual amount of will- 
power and prudence. Health being the chief 
blessing of life after the domestic affections, 
the fact that very rich people have no advan- 
tage over common people in respect to keep- 
ing their health, but rather are at a disadvan- 
tage, suggests strongly that there is a formid- 
able discount on the possession of great riches. 

^atiefactione not S>cpmbent on Weatt^ 

All thinking men and women get the main sat- 
isfactions of life, aside from the domestic joys, 
out of the productive work they do. It is there- 
fore a pertinent inquiry — what occupations 
are open to the very rich, occupations from 
which they can get solid satisfaction? In the 
first place, they can have, on a large scale, the 
satisfaction which accompanies the continuous 
accumulation of property. This satisfaction, 
however, is fortunately a very common one. 
The man or the woman who earns five or six 
hundred dollars a year and lays up a hundred 
dollars of this income, may enjoy this satisfac- 
tion to a high degree. It is a serious error to 

12 



suppose that satisfaction in the acquisition of ^atwfdU 
property is proportionate to the amount of tion6 
property acquired. A man can be as eager and 
pleased over the accumulation of a few hun- 
dred dollars as he can be over a few million ; 
just as it may be much more generous for one 
man or woman to give away five dollars than 
it is for another to give away five hundred 
thousand. That is the reason that property is 
so secure in a democracy. Almost everybody 
has some property; and the man who has a 
little will fight for that little as fiercely as the 
man who has a great deal. The passion for ac- 
cumulation is doubtless highly gratified in the 
very rich man's case ; and there is apparently 
a kind of pride which is gratified by the pos- 
session of monstrous sums merely because 
they are monstrous, just as some people seem 
to be gratified by being twitched through space 
at the rate of fifty miles an hour because it is 
fifty and not twenty. This well-nigh universal 
desire to acquire and accumulate is, of course, 
the source of the progressive prosperity of a 
vigorous and thrifty race. It provides what is 
called capital. The very rich man has unques- 
tionably much more capacity in this direction 
than the average man. He accumulates on a 
much larger scale than the average man, and 

13 



luteal in all probability, although his satisfaction is 
^ic^ee not proportionate to the size of his accumula- 
tions, he gets somewhat more satisfaction from 
this source than the man whose accumulations 
are small. 

To build a palace at fifty years of age in city 
or country, and maintain it handsomely for his 
family, seems to be a natural performance for 
a very rich man. It is interesting to build a pal- 
ace, and it affords some temporary occupation ; 
but it is incredible that this achievement should 
give as much pleasure to the owner as a young 
mechanic gets who has saved a few hundred 
dollars, and then builds a six-room cottage, 
to which he brings a young wife. He, being 
skilful at his trade, builds the cottage largely 
with his own hands, and she, out of her sav- 
ings, provides the household linen and her own 
wardrobe. The achievement of the mechanic 
and his wife is a personal one, hallowed by the 
most sacred loves and hopes. The palace is 
the rich owner's public triumph, finely exe- 
cuted by hired artists and laborers. It is a per- 
sonal achievement only in an indirect way. 



14 



vii fC^e 5Kk5 

(t^e K^ic^ d^an'e povQCt powet 

A great capital at the disposal of a single will 
confers on its possessor power over the course 
of industrial development, over his fellowmen, 
and sometimes over the course of great public 
events like peace or war between nations. For 
some natures it is a real satisfaction to be thus 
a sort of Providence to multitudes of men and 
women, able at pleasure to do them good or 
harm, to give them joy or pain, and in position 
to be feared or looked up to. Great capital di- 
rected by one mind may be compared to the 
mill pond above the dam, which stores power 
subject to the mill owner's direction. There is 
pleasure and satisfaction in directing such a 
power; and the greater the power, the greater 
may be the satisfaction. In giving this direc- 
tion the great capitalist may find an enjoyable 
and strenuous occupation. For a conscientious, 
dutiful man a great sense of responsibility ac- 
companies the possession of power, and this 
sense of responsibility may become so painful 
as to quite overcome all enjoyment of the power 
itself; but nevertheless we cannot but recog- 
nize the fact that the exercise of power gives 
pleasure and satisfaction without this draw- 



iOtcat back to men of arbitrary temperament, or of an 
iRtCqe0 inconsiderate disposition which takes no ac- 
count of the needs or wishes of others. 
The most successful businesses are those 
conducted by remarkably intelligent and just 
autocrats; and probably the same would be 
true of governments, if any mode had been in- 
vented of discovering and putting in place the 
desirable autocrats. The prevailing modes of 
discovery and selection, such as hereditary 
transmission, or election by a Pretorian guard 
or an army, have been so very unsuccessful 
that autocracy as a mode of government has 
justly fallen into disrepute. In business enter- 
prises the existing modes of discovering and 
selecting autocrats seem to be better than in 
governments ; for autocracy in business is of- 
ten justified by its results. The autocrat in 
business is almost invariably a capitalist; and 
when he possesses great riches he may be, and 
often is, highly serviceable to his community 
or his nation through his beneficial direction 
of accumulated and stored power. Whether 
he himself wins satisfaction through the exer- 
cise of his power depends on his temperament, 
disposition, and general condition of physical 
and moral health. When great riches are stored 
up in possession of one man, or one family, the 

i6 



power which resides in them can be directed JlttipvoVi 
by one mind into that channel, or those chan- ^^ ^^^ 
nels, where it can be made most effective, and ^**"*' 
this effective direction it is which brings out in 
high relief the usefulness of great riches. 
What are ordinarily called benefactions— 
that is, gifts for beneficial uses— are, therefore, 
by no means the only benefits very rich men 
can confer on the community to which they 
belong. Any man who, by sound thinking and 
hard work, develops and carries on a produc- 
tive industry, and by his good judgment makes 
that industry both profitable and stable, con- 
fers an immense benefit on society. This is in- 
deed the best outcome of great riches. 

via 

3lmptovin(i t^e iCanb 

Very rich men can, if they choose, win certain 
natural satisfactions which are not accessible 
to the poor or to the merely well-to-do. If they 
have the taste for such labors, they can im- 
prove fields and woods, brooks and ponds, 
make a barren soil fertile, raise the best breeds 
of cattle, horses, swine, and sheep, and in gen- 
eral add to the productiveness and beauty of 
a great estate. They can develop landscape 

17 



iSteat beauty on a large scale, making broad tracts 
^ic^e$ of country more beautiful and more enjoyable. 
Since earth-work is the most durable of all hu- 
man works, the wise improvement of a great 
estate is a lasting contribution to human wel- 
fare and a worthy occupation of any man's 
time. It is a subject which will usefully employ 
all the senses of the keenest observer and the 
best judgment of a prudent but enthusiastic 
inventor and promoter. Whoever makes a farm, 
a forest, or a garden yield more than it did be- 
fore has made a clear addition to mankind's 
control of nature. For persons who have a nat- 
ural taste for such employments a keen grat- 
ification accompanies success in them. Very 
rich men can win this satisfaction with greater 
certainty than men who must always be con- 
sidering whether the improvement they have 
projected will forthwith pay its cost. 
There is, however, a serious drawback on the 
satisfaction very rich men can derive from im- 
proving their estates, namely, an uncertainty 
with regard to the maintenance of the improved 
estate in the family of its chief creator. In this 
country it is difficult to pass down to another 
generation large holdings of land, at least with 
any assurance that the holdings will be kept. 
It frequently happens that no child of the rich 
x8 



man wishes, or is even willing", to keep up its 3mprov 
father's establishment; and indeed, in many jj^g jfi^ 
cases no child is really able to maintain the iCanb 
father's establishment, having received only 
a fraction of the father's capital. Estates inher- 
ited through three generations are rare in 
the United States, particularly great estates 
brought together by very rich men. Ordinary 
farms are in a few cases transmitted through 
three generations, and some farms which have 
been lost to the family which made them are 
at times bought back in later generations by 
descendants of the original proprietors ; but on 
the whole the transmission of landed estates 
from generation to generation is unusual in 
this country. Any rich man, therefore, who 
spends thought and money on the improve- 
ment of a large estate must always feel uncer- 
tain whether his fields and woods will remain 
in the possession of his family. In the neigh- 
borhood of large cities almost the only way to 
make sure that an estate, which the owner has 
greatly improved by his own thoughtfulness 
and skill, will remain in good condition is to 
get the estate converted into a public domain. 
On an estate which becomes public property 
the chances are that all improvements will be 
maintained and that care will be taken to pre- 

19 



iSteat serve all its landscape beauties. It is only a 

3RiC$ee generous and public-spirited man, however, 

who looks forward with satisfaction to this fate 

for fields and forests which have become dear 

to him. 

(t(je S^iQfjet <I>ppottmitie$ of Weaft? 

In some exceptional cases a rich man uses his 
riches in pursuit of intellectual satisfactions 
of his own, for the full attainment of which 
riches are necessary, but which are in no way 
connected with his capacity for accumulating 
property. Such a fortunate rich man, having 
acquired great wealth, uses it to meet the 
costs of his own scientific investigations, or in 
acquiring a fine library on a subject to which 
he had devoted himself before he was rich ; or 
he retires somewhat early in life from money- 
making and gives himself to study and author- 
ship with every aid or facility which money can 
procure. These are the most fortunate of rich 
men. They obtain congenial intellectual satis- 
factions. They make themselves serviceable, 
and they have a better chance than most rich 
men of bringing up serviceable children. 
It is obvious that very rich men have power 
to render services to the public which it is im- 

20 



possible for poor men or men of moderate in- ^g^ 
comes to render. They can endow churches, fotg^^t 
schools, universities, libraries, hospitals, mu- Oppor^ 
seums, gardens, and parks with sums large tnnitic6 of 
enough to give these institutions stability and VPcatt^ 
continuous usefulness. They can also come to 
the aid of private individuals who have suffered 
through illness, premature death of friends, 
or other disasters which justify helplessness. 
They can help widows and children bereft of 
their natural protectors and bread-winners. 
They can help young men and women to an 
education which will raise for the persons 
helped the whole level of their subsequent lives. 
All these things they can do on a scale impos- 
sible to men of moderate means. Great riches 
are constantly used in our country in all these 
ways to an extent which has never before been 
equalled, and which entitles the American very 
rich man to be recognized as a type by himself. 
The first question which arises about this 
beneficial use of great wealth is this : Does it 
give pleasure or satisfaction to the givers ; and 
is this pleasure or satisfaction, if any, propor- 
tionate to the magnitude of the gifts? Does a 
man who gives $100,000 to a college or an 
academy get more pleasure from his gift than 
a man who gives $1,000, the first man being 

21 



iSteat one hundred times richer than the second man ? 

^ictfce That there is real pleasure or satisfaction for 
the giver in his giving is altogether probable; 
and it is quite possible that the pleasure in 
large giving is proportionate to that largeness, 
although the pleasure of acquisition is not pro- 
portionate to the amount acquired. Experience 
seems to show that it is difficult for a very rich 
man to give away intelligently and with enjoy- 
ment as large a proportion of his income as a 
man! in moderate circumstances can easily give 
away. The proportion of an income given away 
ought to mount rapidly with the increase of 
the income, but experience indicates that it 
does not. It is no easy task to select wisely ob- 
jects for great benefactions and to give money 
to the selected objects without doing injury. 
Thus, to endow a church, unless with its build- 
ing and equipment only, is generally a mis- 
chief, not a benefit. The giving of thoroughly 
good things, like education and opportunities 
for travel or healthful exercise, to young peo- 
ple who are not bound to the giver by ties of 
kinship is accompanied by great difficulties. It 
is easy to pauperize the individuals helped. It 
is easy to destroy their self-reliance and their 
capacity for productive labor. 



22 



iSivm 6p ia^en of Weaft? Weaul 

Very rich men differ greatly with regard to 
their method of giving. Some give quickly, 
with slight investigation concerning the ob- 
jects to which they give. Others make the most 
careful and thorough investigation before mak- 
ing gifts, employing experienced agents in 
their inquiries, and ascertaining the merits and 
demerits, the advantages and disadvantages, 
of the institution or society they think to aid. 
Some men of great wealth approach the whole 
subject of giving away money with conscien- 
tiousness and with a painful sense of respon- 
sibility for the use of wealth entrusted to them ; 
and this sense of responsibility may greatly 
impair their comfort or satisfaction in the 
power to give. Other men, no richer, give away 
great sums without serious examination and 
without any oppressive sense that they hold 
their property in trust for the benefit of the 
community. One anxiety, which most conscien- 
tious givers on a large scale feel, is the anxi- 
ety lest, by coming with large gifts to the sup- 
port of an institution or association, they im- 
pair what may be called the natural or consti- 
tutional resources of the institution or associ- 

23 



iStcat ^^^^^ —such, for example, as the giving power 
KRicBc$ ^^ ^^^ alumni of a college or the yield of the 
annual taxes or subscriptions in a church. It 
is commonly dangerous for a school, or college, 
or library to get the reputation of being the 
special charge of a very rich individual or fam- 
ily. On this account givers of large sums often 
make it a condition of their gifts that some 
other sum shall be procured simultaneously 
from other friends of the institution. Every 
very rich man who is in the habit of making 
gifts to individuals and to institutions has met, 
in many instances, with a complete or partial 
defeat of his benevolent purpose ; but most of 
these defeats or failures occur in attempts to 
aid individuals rather than institutions. The 
nineteenth century witnessed a considerable 
change in the destination of endowments. En- 
dowments for palliating some of the evils that 
afflict society used to be the commonest, such 
as endowments for almshouses, doles, and hos- 
pitals ; but now endowments for various sorts 
of education— such as academies, colleges, 
free-lecture courses, libraries, and museums 
supply— have become the commonest; and 
these last forms are far the wisest, because 
they are much more than palliations of evil. 

They are creators and diffusers of good. 
24 



Through this change the chance of the very (^^e C0if^ 
rich man to do perpetual good with his money bten of 
has been greatly increased ; and surely the t0C lOCt^ 
hope of doing some perpetual good with the jKiC^ 
product of one's intelligence, skill, and indus- 
try is one of the brightest of human hopes. 

ipi 

(t^e €tii(bten of ttje t>n^ Mc^ 

The most serious disadvantage under which 
very rich people labor is in the bringing up of 
their children. It is well-nigh impossible for a 
very rich man to defend his children from habits 
of self-indulgence, laziness, and selfishness. 
The children are so situated, both at home 
and at school, that they have no opportunity 
of acquiring any habit of productive labor. 
They do nothing for themselves, or for their 
parents and brothers and sisters. They have 
no means of acquiring the habit of cooperative 
work except in their sports, and in not all of 
those. The farmer's children cooperate from 
their tenderest years in the work of the house- 
hold and the farm. The very rich man's child 
is absolutely deprived of that invaluable train- 
ing. Moreover, the artificial training which a 
very rich man can buy in the market for his 

25 



iSvcat ^^^^^ ^^ determined as to its quality, not by his 
Kic6e^ own intelligence and wishes, but by what for- 
mer generations have produced in the way of 
educational institutions and private tuition. 
The rich man can find no better school for his 
boy and girl than has been developed without 
his aid, and mostly by a preceding generation. 
When the multi-millionaire comes to realize 
that he wants something for his child which 
the institutions of his time do not furnish, he 
can help to improve the defective institutions 
for the benefit of other people's children in 
subsequent years, but it is too late to improve 
them for his own children. The very rich man's 
sons know, first, that they will have no need 
of earning their living; secondly, that their fa- 
ther can, if he choose, enable them to marry 
early, and to continue to live, without any ex- 
ertion on their part, in the same luxurious 
way in which they have always lived in their 
father's house; thirdly, that mental exertion 
will be as unnecessary for them as physical 
exertion. They are therefore deprived of all the 
ordinary motives for industry and the assidu- 
ous cultivation of their powers, bodily and 
mental. Further, it is almost impossible to 
bring them up to a simple habit of life which 
takes account of the feelings and interests of 
26 



others. Unless disciplined by ill-health or other ^g^ C0if^ 
personal misfortunes, they almost inevitably ^tetl of 
become self-indulgent and unambitious. This t^c ioctf 
condition of a rich man's children is worse in Mictf 
the democratic society of the United States 
than in the older aristocratic societies of Eu- 
rope, because here no duties or responsibilities 
are inherited with their riches by the rich 
man's children. The children of the rich have 
with us no duties to the state, and no recog- 
nized duties to their family, or even to the cre- 
ator of their wealth. They are not even bound 
to maintain their father's establishment. They 
are placed under no obligation to live where 
their father did, to carry on his business, to 
maintain his benefactions, or to build on any 
foundations which he laid. When property con- 
sists of stocks and bonds, almost all the safe- 
guards with which feudal society surrounded 
the transmission of titles and great estates 
from father to son fail to take effect. 
The very rich man who succeeds, as some do 
succeed, in bringing up his children to useful 
and honorable careers of their own, has had, 
then, enormous difficulties to overcome. He 
can only overcome them through the influence 
of his own personal character, quite apart from 
the qualities which made him very rich. He 

27 



i^teat must possess for himself, and inspire in his 
3(Ric^e6 children, nobler ambitions than that of being 
very rich. He must have a high purpose in the 
use of riches, which his children can see and 
learn to imitate ; and the convincing proof that 
he himself was possessed by a noble purpose 
will be the fact that his children escape the great 
dangers of being brought up rich, and develop 
a correspondingly high purpose in their own 
lives. There are, of course, many cases among 
the children of the rich where the parents' na- 
ture is not transmitted to the children, very 
unlike tendencies appearing in the children 
from any that the parents exhibited, as when 
scholarly children with artistic, literary, or sci- 
entific tastes appear in the families of unedu- 
cated parents whose practical sagacity and in- 
dustry have made them rich. The impossibility 
of bringing up children satisfactorily in lux- 
urious homes has led to the establishment of 
boarding schools of various sorts for the chil- 
dren of the rich ; and these schools have stead- 
ily increased in number and variety during the 
past thirty years. They are more necessary for 
boys than for girls, because the nature of boys 
is more perverted by luxury than the nature 
of girls, perhaps because enterprise and am- 
bition seem more indispensable in a man than 
28 



in a woman. It seems to be easier to make a (^^C C^if^ 
boy selfish and indifferent to the feelings and bten of 
rights of others than to spoil a girl in that way. ^5f jOev^ 
The effects which very rich people have on ^'^9 
their fellowmen are various, being much af- 
fected by the personal qualities of the possess- 
ors of great wealth and by the popular beliefs 
as to the sources of their wealth. The mul- 
titude recognize that they themselves are 
strongly influenced by the very same hopes 
and desires which have been gratified in the 
case of possessors of great wealth. In a de- 
mocracy nearly every man and woman wishes 
and hopes to earn more and more money, and 
to lay up more and more money, and so to 
become more and more independent of the 
anxiety which inevitably accompanies depend- 
ence on daily toil to meet daily wants. More- 
over, nearly every man and woman admires 
and respects those abilities which make men 
rich, — acquisitiveness, frugality, industry, and 
business sagacity,— so that they are prepared 
to admire and respect those who possess in 
a high degree these qualities. On the other 
hand, the multitude is disposed to despise and 
condemn the self-indulgence and the luxury 
which degrade and corrupt the possessors of 
great riches, together with their children and 

29 



iSteat their dependents. The multitude feels a mild 
^icqe6 reprobation of extravagance, but a hearty con- 
tempt for penuriousness and lack of generos- 
ity in the very rich. It always experiences, and 
often expresses, a displeased surprise when 
a man who has lived without generosity and 
without splendor is discovered at his death 
to have been very rich. This is a kind of ad- 
verse posthumous judgment which never over- 
took the very rich in the earlier days when all 
property was visible, as in land, buildings, 
flocks, herds, and chattels. Not even generous 
testamentary dispositions will reconcile the 
American public to a penurious life on the part 
of a rich man. 

pnidc 3lnbsmcnt6 of t^c 5(Rtc? 

The judgments of the public concerning the 
means by which great riches have been ac- 
quired are fickle and uncertain, because, for 
the most part, made in the dark. In this re- 
spect the public has little confidence in its own 
impressions, unless legal proceedings have 
brought to light the course of conduct and 
events which profited the possessors of great 
wealth, or the habitual mode of conducting the 
business which yielded great wealth. In spite 
30 



of the fact that monopolies have for centuries pu6ftC 
been hateful to the main body of the consumers jln^Q^/ 
in every nation, the judgment of the public is tttcnt6 of 
ordinarily a lenient one toward the creators of ^v^ MtCi] 
successful monopolies, because every one rec- 
ognizes in himself a longing to secure some 
sort of monopoly — to become the possessor, 
for example, of some little art or little skill 
which nobody else possesses, to raise a vegeta- 
ble or a flower which nobody else can raise, to 
write a book or paint a picture which nobody 
else can produce, to practice a trade or a pro- 
fession without any effective competitors, or to 
invent or manufacture a patented article which 
nobody else can make. The manufacture of a 
patented article affords a perfect example of 
monopoly ; but the American people, at least, 
are thoroughly accustomed to such perfect 
monopolies, and, on the whole, believe them 
to be suitable rewards for beneficial inventions. 
In spite, therefore, of the evils caused to the 
great body of consumers by monopolies, the 
jPi merican public is gentle in its judgment of 
ti ^onduct of very rich men who have dis- 
ci ___^^und profited enormously by advantages 
in business which nobody else could or did 
procure. Almost every business man feels that 
if he had had the skill, or the luck, to seize 

31 



ioteat upon some such advantage, he would not have 
iRlC^eo hesitated to do so. A community which is thor- 
oughly possessed in all its strata with a desire 
and a purpose to better itself is not likely to be 
harsh in its judgment of men who have con- 
spicuously succeeded in so doing. To be sure, 
if a very rich man in pursuing the gratification 
of his own desires interferes with what his 
neighbors regard as their own traditional 
rights and customs, as, for instance, by enclos- 
ing large areas over which his neighbors have 
freely fished or hunted, or by occupying shores 
which have been open to the resort of a whole 
neighborhood, he is apt to encounter popular 
condemnation. If he pursues his pleasures 
with conspicuous disregard of the comfort or 
safety of other people he is likely to get into 
trouble, unless, as is often the case, he can 
manage in his pursuit of his own pleasures to 
appear to be only enjoying, or perhaps defend- 
ing, valuable rights acquired by the whole 
public. 

(t^e Wottb'e Ttttitnbe (tovQatb ^icfj fl^en 

In the long run the possessor of great wealth 
is judged in part by the use he makes of his 
riches, including in that use his disposal of 
32 



them at his death, in part by the nature of the (^^e 
business which made him rich, and in part by WotCb^6 
the moral quality he manifests in the conduct Jlttttubc 
of his business. If it appears that the rich man (^OVQdtO 
recognized his responsibility to society for a ^^^"*^?^^ 
right use of his wealth, the public will forgive 
much expenditure for his own pleasures and 
for the pleasures of his family, and for the se- 
curity of his children against the possibility of 
future want. They will condone great extrava- 
gance and waste if, on the whole, a high and 
liberal purpose guided the man in his accumu- 
lations and in his benefactions. The peculiar 
faculties and powers which lead to the accumu- 
lation of riches resemble all other human fac- 
ulties and powers in the following respect,— 
they may all be degraded and made sordid by 
a low purpose or elevated and exalted by a 
noble one. This is just as true of the powers 
of memory, invention, and penetrative reason- 
ing as it is of that practical sagacity which 
leads to the possession of wealth. Even love, 
that all-hallowing motive when it is pure, un- 
selfish, and spiritual, becomes a fearful imple- 
ment of moral destruction if it be low and ani- 
mal. The very rich man is, then, not to be pro- 
nounced admirable and happy, or contemptible 
and miserable, until his account is made up and 

33 -* 



iOteat the dominant purpose of his life is made plain. 

^lCqC6 Again, the rich man is judged in part by the 
quality of the product which made him rich. 
A beneficial product tends to sanctify riches ; 
a harmful product poisons them. The public 
judgment is gentler toward men who got rich 
by producing or selling good petroleum, steel, 
or copper than it is toward men who produce or 
sell whiskey, patent medicines, lottery tickets, 
or advertising space for immoral undertak- 
ings. Riches acquired in making mankind 
more comfortable or healthier are much more 
likely to give satisfaction to their possessor, 
and through him to benefit society, than riches 
acquired through products which are injurious 
to mankind and so increase the sum of human 
misery. 

pnMcitf a ^afmiatb fot Wcatt^ 

In regard to judging the morality of the pro- 
cesses by which great wealth has been ac- 
quired the public must always meet with se- 
rious difficulties and delays; proof of miscon- 
duct is hard to get, and even the courts some- 
times give an uncertain sound, for business 
methods which are not illegal may neverthe- 
less be decidedly immoral; for instance, they 
34 



Weait^ 



may be cruel, greedy, or treacherous, but within P^ftf ttp 
the law. Bought suppressions of truth, which ^ ^^W 
in the public interest should be told, are usu- ^^^^^1 
ally immoral but not illegal. The only sure pro- 
tection of the rich man against suspicions and 
adverse judgments in this respect is publicity 
for his methods and results. Many businesses 
are now under sufficient government super- 
vision to secure some measure of publicity; 
those conducted in secrecy and with no peri- 
odic publication of results are liable to intense 
suspicion on the part of the public whenever 
they yield immense fortunes for individuals at 
short notice. In such cases the public always 
suspects some sort of foul play or some un- 
earned increment not fairly attributable to un- 
usual foresight. The suddenly rich man finds 
that the presumptions are all against him in 
the public mind, and that the public ear is open 
to the prosecuting attorney but shut to the 
defence. This distrust is the inevitable penalty 
for secrecy in money getting on a large scale. 
Many years may elapse before it is possible to 
get the final verdict, and oblivion may easily 
arrive before justice. 

The very rich people, then, like most other 
things and forces in this world, are a mixed 
product, and may work either good or evil for 

35 



iStcat their neighborhood and their nation. Some of 
^icqC& them do great harm by giving conspicuous 
examples of self-indulgent, pleasure-seeking, 
trivial lives ; others do great good by illustrat- 
ing the noble and beneficent use of wealth. 
Some of them, in seeking their selfish ends, 
corrupt legislatures and courts, trample on the 
weak, betray trusts, cheat the law, deceive or 
bribe the agents of the law, raise the prices of 
necessaries of life, and by their example lower 
the moral standards of the business commu- 
nity; others use all their influence to improve 
legislation, the administration of justice, the 
management of corporations— including that 
of towns and cities— the execution of trusts, 
and the education of the people, and to diffuse 
and cheapen the good gifts of nature. The es- 
timate which the rest of us form of the rela- 
tively few very rich men is guided by our opin- 
ions concerning their personal characters. We 
despise and abhor the coarse, ostentatious, self- 
ish, unjust multi-millionaire, while we admire 
and respect the refined, generous, and just rich 
man, be his millions few or many, be his ben- 
efactions direct through gifts to hospitals, 
churches, and colleges, or indirect through the 
improvement of the industries which maintain 



36 



and extend civilization or the beautification fjo Ji6ib^ 
of the common life. itiQ €ia$6 

of5Kic9 

It is quite unnecessary in this country to feel 
alarm about the rise of a permanent class of 
very rich people. To transmit great estates is 
hard. They get divided or dispersed. The heirs 
are often unable to keep their inherited treas- 
ures, or, if by the help of lawyers and other 
hired agents they manage to keep them, they 
cease to accumulate, and only spend. This is 
one of the natural effects on his children of the 
very rich man's mode of life. With rarest ex- 
ceptions the very rich men of to-day are not 
the sons of the very rich men of thirty years 
ago, but are new men. It will be the same 
thirty years hence. The wise rich father will 
try to put his sons into those beneficent pro- 
fessions and occupations which have strong 
intellectual and moral interest, and in which 
pecuniary independence is a distinct advan- 
tage. Such are the public service in elective or 
appointive offices, the ministry, scientific re- 
search, social service, and the management of 



37 



-jo charities and of serviceable endowed institu- 

^icdee ^^^^^' Inherited wealth enables young men to 
devote themselves early to these fine employ- 
ments, which are not pecuniarily remunerative 
but yet possess the highest sort of interest and 
offer all the rewards of beneficent influence 
among men. From persons so occupied, from 
the ranks of the learned and scientific profes- 
sions, and from the more intellectual and use- 
ful sorts of business, the highest class of each 
generation in a democracy is in large meas- 
ure recruited. The new-made very rich may 
or may not belong to this class. The chances 
are against them, unless they prove themselves 
men of distinction both mentally and morally. 
One of the best tests of the worth of free in- 
stitutions is their capacity to produce a nu- 
merous class of superior persons— rich, well- 
off, comfortable, or just self-supporting— a 
class larger in proportion to the mass of the 
people, and more meritorious than any other 
form of government has produced. All signs in- 
dicate that the American democracy will meet 
this test. 



$C« 26 I9M 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 







